Eine Kleine Murder (20 page)

“Anyone with knowledge of events that evening should report to the Henry County Sheriff's Office.”

Good grief! Al Harmon's knife! It could be him! Poison! It could be Eve! It could be anybody!

I didn't want it to be either one of them. There was one more likely candidate now, though. And it might be a piece of the puzzle that would tell me more about Toombs's death. I slipped on a pair of jeans, a sweater, and my sneakers and stole out the door to see what Martha had put under the stone.

Chapter 36

Fantasia: A work in which the author's fancy roves unrestricted; something possessing grotesque, bizarre, or unreal qualities (Ital.)

It was another clear, fair day, the air soft and caressing against my cheek. I climbed out of my car, shouldered my purse, burning with its burden, and, again, walked through the high-ceilinged Victorian portion of the county building, then up the graceful wrought-iron staircase to Sheriff Dobson's office. First, however, I would have to get past the pleasant-looking brunette behind the glass barricade once more.

Pleasant-looking, that is, until she saw it was me on the other side. Before I could state my business she intercommed with a snarl into the sheriff's office that “Miss Carraway is here again.” I didn't care for her tone of voice. In answer to a muffled question she replied she was sure she didn't know.

“Be with you in a minute,” she said to me, riffling through the papers on her desk instead of looking at me.

I felt, even in the modern part of the building, like I had stepped into another century. Most of the building, indeed much of the town, had been built in the eighteen hundreds. The two-story wooden houses trimmed in gingerbread, so typical of that period, faced the quiet streets with their wrap-around porches, some of them with round corner towers. But the town's slow pace vanished inside the sheriff's portion of this building.

The receptionist, turning pleasant again, soon asked me to have a seat on a bench against the wall. Finally, Sheriff Dobson came to the heavy door, swung it open, and waved me into his cluttered office, an annoyed frown on his face. He sat on the edge of his desk while I took the plastic chair, then raised his bristling white-blond eyebrows in question. “You need to talk to me?” His sky-blue eyes were cold.

I wonder if he thinks I'm going to confess.
“Yes, I'm afraid I've found something. Something new.”

After a long-suffering type of a sigh, he said, “Let's see it.”

I opened my purse with shaky fingers and pulled out the plastic baggie that held a couple of mushrooms, plus an extra surprise from under Martha Toombs's stepping stone. The mushrooms were crushed flat, but still recognizable as such, tan with white spots on the tops and white gills underneath. I held the bag out to him. He reached for it.

“And this is?”

“Well …” I took a breath and began, looking at the floor to avoid those eyes. “I was out last night and walked by Martha Toombs's place. It was after dark. She didn't see me.” He drummed his usual pencil on his desk and swung the bag with the other hand. “She was prying up one of the stepping stones in their walkway and I saw her put something under it.”

“And this is it?” He waved the bag at me. “How did you get it?”

“I went back later and found those mushrooms squashed under the rock like that. And those earrings.”

“They were in this bag?”

“Noooo, I carried them to my place and put them in the bag. I just took a couple of them. The rest are still there.” I still didn't look up. If this was grilling, I didn't like it.

“And why do you think we would want these things?” He ducked his head down trying to catch my eye. I knew those blue eyes would be icy. It felt cold in the office.

“Because, because I think the mushrooms are poison—Death Angels.”

“More poison? And your theory, I assume, is that Mrs. Toombs poisoned her husband?” He slid off the corner of his desk.

“I don't know. But the news report said they're not positive he died of the stab wounds. He might have died of poisoning. Why would she be hiding these things at night, anyway?” I looked up at him with my question.

“That's a good point.
If
she did.” He stepped closer and loomed over me.

“What do you mean, if she did?” Ah, yes, this was indeed grilling. I had never felt truly threatened by him before. But I did now.

“Once again, I only have your word for it that you saw her bury these and that you retrieved them. Once again, if you had told us they were there, we could have uncovered them ourselves and would know where they came from, wouldn't we? The chain of custody would be maintained and they could actually be used as evidence, if the day ever comes when we need them.”

He raised those thick eyebrows again. His look was still cold. My blood ran similarly.

“But there are more under the stone. And why would I lie about it?”

“Maybe to incriminate Mrs. Toombs.” His voice was soft. He moved in even closer. “Maybe because you don't like her. Maybe because you fed the mushrooms to Toombs yourself and you want to shift the blame. Maybe you put mushrooms in Mrs. Toombs's yard yourself.”

The room wasn't cold any longer. He hunched over me and an unpleasant heat of intimidation emanated from him. A faint tinge of pungent aftershave hung in the stale office air. I sucked in a hot lungful of it. “You… you really think I did it? I killed him?”

“No, not really.” He relented. He backed up, lifted his hip onto the corner of his desk again, and tossed the bag onto his blotter with a plop. “I really think you're tampering with evidence, though. This, like the cookies, is stolen property, technically speaking. We'll examine these, but we won't be able to use them as evidence.”

I tried to let my breath out slowly, unobtrusively. “Well, there are more mushrooms still there. But what about the earrings? They're in the bag, too.”

He re-examined the bag. His raised eyebrows said,
okay, what about them?

“Did Grace Harmon tell the police her diamond earrings had been stolen?” I asked.

“Not that I know of.”

“Well, they were. She thought Mo Toombs took them.”

“Are these Mrs. Harmon's earrings?”

“Probably.”

“Probably.” He threw the bag down, jumped off the desk, and exploded his words in my face. “What in the hell am I supposed to do with a pair of earrings that
might
have belonged to a dead woman?”

I hadn't been willing to ask Al if he recognized them, thinking it might upset him more. This, evidently, had been bad planning on my part.

“I… don't know.” I shrank into the hard plastic chair. “It… seemed like evidence.”

“Let
us
gather evidence after this. You're
not
helping. Besides—” He sighed. “You might get yourself into a bad spot, Cressa.” Was he worried about me?

He gave the baggie another doubtful glance. “We'll look into the earrings and, if they were stolen from Mrs. Harmon, I have a pretty good idea who stole them.”

I let out the air I had been holding again.

“Go on home,” he continued. “We won't arrest you for murder today. Should you find anything else you consider relevant, though, please, please, please let me handle it.”

“Yes, yes I will.” I jumped up and headed for the door.

“And Miss Carraway—” I stopped and whirled around. I was Miss Carraway again, not Cressa. That was a bad sign. “You need to keep in mind that three people have been murdered at the place where you're staying. If it looks like you know too much about those murders, your life will be in danger.”

That thought had crossed my mind, too. “Uh. Yeah.” My voice broke as I hurried, with relief, through the door he held open for me. I turned back a moment.

“Thanks, Sheriff Dobson. Please don't tell anyone I found those things. Could it be confidential?”

“Maybe. We'll see.”

When I returned to the lake I couldn't even think about concentrating on the finishing touches for my music. The room spun slightly as I stood in the middle of it. My head hummed with tension.

For once, Ivan cooperated and I called Neek.

“Is your tummy feeling better?”

“Yes, much. How about your back?”

“Could be better.”

“Those kids are in the hospital. I hope they'll be okay.”

“And are you okay with finding that body? Three, Cressa. My God!”

“I know. Listen, I just went to the county sheriff and took him some things I shouldn't have.”

“Huh?”

“He was pretty steamed about it. He says I shouldn't have touched them, and, damn it, I knew that, but …”

“Cressa, some day you'll have to start looking before you leap. How many times have you done this now?! Jeez!”

“Not you, too, UU.” I used to be so overly cautious. Maybe I'd started a tendency toward all this premature leaping at the same time—dating inappropriate guys and making rash decisions about other things, too. I was beginning to think the rebellious nature that started in my late teens might do me in.”

I heard her sigh. “Gosh, you're having a tough time, kiddo. I'm sorry. I won't yell at you anymore. Well, what did you find? And mess up?”

I told her about the mushrooms and earrings, but then remembered. “Oh crap!” I said. “I forgot to ask him about the cushion.”

“What cushion?”

“I saw the tractor cushion at the side of the path when I found Toombs's body, but when I went back to look for it, it wasn't there. Sheriff Dobson got me so rattled I forgot to mention it.” I explained to her how I thought that meant the tractor had transported the body.

“At least I didn't touch that cushion. I can imagine the lecture I'd get. Maybe with handcuffs. Should I go back and talk to the Sheriff?”

“Cressa, no. Just sit tight. They'll find the killer. Look, I have a couple customers lined up. Gotta go. Take care.”

After the call ended I looked around the cabin. It closed in on me like a death trap. I slipped into a bathing suit, grabbed my beach bag, and slammed the door on my way out. I was becoming accustomed to fleeing to the beach. It was a safe place to be, in plain sight where no one could harm me.

But before I got there, Martha beckoned me from her doorway.

Oh damn—I really didn't feel like facing her right now. Would she detect my guilt? Could she already know I'd taken the mushrooms?

I walked to her door. Had she used the mushrooms to poison Toombs? There might be another explanation for her odd behavior the night before. But what could it possibly be?

“Good morning, Martha. Beautiful day today.”
If she's a murderer, the one thing I must not do is let her know I saw her last night.

“I need to finish,” she said. She peered out the door, swiveled her head around, adorned with its ever-present rollers, and pulled me inside. Mo's car was in the driveway again, but I saw no sign of him in the house. I wondered if he ever worked at that bowling alley. The hours must have been pretty liberal.

“Okay,” she began. “This time I have to tell you. I don't have much time.”

She didn't, though. Her mouth was moving, but she didn't get any more words out.

“Martha, if you have something to say, say it.”

Her wounded look told me I had spoken too harshly.

“I do have something you need to know.” More silence. She walked away from me and headed toward the kitchen.

This was maddening. I took off after her, grabbed her arms and spun her around, shouting. “Martha, what the hell are you trying to say?”

She stared down at my hands. I was squeezing her arms. Too hard.

“I'm sorry, Martha,” I said, letting my hands drop. My fingers left red dents in her soft flesh.

“No, no. I do have to say it. I thought,” she went on, rubbing her upper arms. “I mean, I told you my husband acted strangely the night your grandmother died. That's not quite true. What I've been trying to tell you …” Her voice trailed off.

I waited a long moment, resisting the urge to grab and shake her again.

“He killed them. My husband killed them.” Her face began to crumple.

My knees weakened. I groped in back of me for a place to sit. Was she delusional? How could she know that?

“Do you want to sit down?” I asked Martha. We were both standing in the middle of the room. “Do you want a drink of water?”

“No, let me finish.” She flapped her hands for me to wait and let her go on. I sank onto the couch. “The girls thought they saw Mo, but the night Ida drowned, Mo wasn't even here, he was up in Moline for a couple of days. You know Mo and his father look alike in some lights? Looked, looked alike, I mean. The girls saw their grandfather, not their uncle.” She looked away.

“His clothes were all wet when he came in that night, the night your grandmother drowned. He said he'd fallen off the dock.”

“What? And why would your husband kill her, and Grace, too? Both of them?”

“They said Mo stole their jewelry.”

“You think your husband killed my grandmother and Grace because they accused Mo of stealing?” Would a person actually murder someone because of that?

This was too close to what I had envisioned—Gram confronting the Toombses and them killing her. Not Mo, but his father.